Words That Do Not Readily Come to Mind

There are certain words that I normally cannot think of when I need to say them. I'll know what I mean to say, conceptually, but it is just remembering the word that gets me. List the ones that bedevil you, or should I say... which do not bedevil you.

Provenance

Catharsis

Improvise - ironically, when I go blank on "improvise" I must improvise to find a substitute phrase.

There are some words that don't have any/many synonyms. If your word is one of these, you will have a harder time of it in these instances.

I had some others, but I cannot think of them at the moment now... What is the one that refers to someone being given a partial refund, and this word describes the process of the calculation required to do so ?

"The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them that they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
Reichsfuhrer Herman Goering at the Nuremburg trials.

I get that very often... I know there's a phrase to describe what I wanted to say but I couldn't recall it. Other times it's spelling. I was sitting in front of the computer yesterday trying to figure out how "conquer" was spelt. I kept on trying to search using "c" or "k" in the dictionary. Ended up googling computer games for conquer online.

I mostly attribute it to english not being my mother tongue... strangely though I'm better at english than cantonese.

I sometimes hesitate between which word to use ( if I can even remember them both ) when thinking of "caveat" and "proviso".

Also I'm thinking of the words "conversely" and "corollary". I can usually think of them, but I have to tread carefully as to their true meaning.

"The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them that they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
Reichsfuhrer Herman Goering at the Nuremburg trials.

I was sitting in front of the computer yesterday trying to figure out how "conquer" was spelt.

I would not have guessed that English isn't your native tongue. Spelling can be tricky, too, and I remember we had a thread on that somewhere ( here or at INTPc ) and the one I goof up on constantly now is to use only one "r" in "embarrass." Also I want to spell "bureau" as "beureau" or variations of that. "Lisence" or "lisense" vs. "license". I also keep thinking there is a "c" before the "q" in "clique"

Originally Posted by Mondo

Words like "arbitrary" and "modicum" don't come to me very regularly.

I don't know why "modicum" comes fairly easily to me, but it does. However, there aren't many occasions when it is called for. I don't think I have used "arbitrary" but a few times in my entire life. It must come so hard to me that I simply use workarounds. I didn't even realize how tough that one was until I read your post. It is one step beyond being "on the tip of the tongue", IOW - "not even ready in the pipeline".

I remember trying to figure out "eponymous" by context alone and failing. I kept imagining all sorts of different meanings. When I finally found out what it meant it was...... anticlimactic.

"Dilettante" was one that I couldn't think of once, and I also couldn't think of how one would go about looking it up.

"The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them that they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
Reichsfuhrer Herman Goering at the Nuremburg trials.

"Phenomenon" and its derivatives seem to be a problem for some reason. Not that I have a problem with THINKING of the word(s), but the m's and n's invariably get reeversed in my mind, no matter how many times I tell myself what the correct way to pronounce/spell it is. At least I can stop and check it in writing, but I keep having to think of an instant synonym when I'm speaking and about to use the word, because I can virtually guarantee it's going to come out the wrong way. This is when I find that there are no perfect synonyms for the word, which is presumably the only reason we're still using it :sad:

I actually forget the names of normal, everyday objects that I'm trying to talk about. On the other hand, I never forget words like catharsis, improvise, or modicum. As far as words representing concepts are concerned, I can usually remember words if they have a subtly different meaning from similar words, but I can almost NEVER remember any actual synonyms. So, paper -writing was often a chore, but I always kicked ass on "Blank is to Blank as Blank is to Blank" tests. Guess which talent has more practical applications...